What Women Want?

So Blogadda has another contest: What Women Want? No, I am not participating but simply thinking a loud.

My problem with the topic (oh yes, I have a problem. Why else will I write a post, if not complain?): who is eligible to write on such a topic?

Men are, by default, unqualified to write about this topic. How can they possibly know what women want? At the most they can ask women in their lives (or speculate, or make sexist jokes/comments) what they want and still I am pretty sure, it will be hard for them to understand it completely, let alone write about it.

Women? Can any woman, or any individual, really know what all women want? there are approximately 3 billion of us. Each of us lives in different society, have to obey different sets of rules, have different life situations and hence, have completely different needs and wants. For example, a woman in war torn Somalia would want not to be raped while a woman in India would simply want the freedom of walking on the road without a frown, to ward off any molestation attempts.  How can one woman tell what all of us want? Isn’t it ridiculous to bundle 3 billion individuals in one and wonder what they want?  And yet, we find so many theories on the subject and all start with the same claim: Women are mysteries or no one knows what women want etc. If you bundle 3 billion individuals into one and then try to decipher what they want, of course, you will be confused. It will certainly seem like a mystery.

You see, here is the thing. Women are not animals that you can study and learn about their behavior, habits, needs or desires (oh well, technically we are all animals but you know what I mean). You can’t go looking for “patterns” among intelligent individuals. We all process information differently, so is it fair that we try to categorize ourselves in such broad classes? Can we really classify the human race in two groups: man and woman, and then go defining the traits of each group? Is the question:  “What women want?” (or the question “what men want?”, for that matter) really a fair question to ask?

P.S.: I have serious objection over comments like: “Even women don’t know what they want?”, or “Even God is trying to find that one out!” etc (and these types of comments are always from, surprise surprise, a man. The individuals that are completely unqualified to say anything on the subject and yet, they have to comment). Do men really think they are better than that? Are you seriously telling me that men don’t have mood swings, or that they don’t take out their work frustrations by snapping at people closest to them, or that they don’t cry, despite all the social conditioning (the things they accuse women of and the reason they claim no one knows what they want)? Because they do. They don’t want to admit it and would probably make fun of any male, who they think does such things but at some point, they all have done that. They are, after all, humans too; and having emotions is a human trait.